


Constants

by Tassos



Category: due South
Genre: Angst, Apocalypse, Community: fandom_stocking, Future Fic, M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-01-05
Updated: 2011-01-05
Packaged: 2017-10-14 11:09:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,583
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/148642
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Tassos/pseuds/Tassos
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Ray wasn't back by sundown, Ray went out after him, and Fraser keeps watch by the window.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Constants

**Author's Note:**

  * For [beggar_always](https://archiveofourown.org/users/beggar_always/gifts).



> Beta thanks to girl_wonder

As soon as he sees them coming down the street, two figures stumbling down the middle of the road in the moonlight reflecting off the half-melted snow, Fraser jumps from his post, the curtain falling from his hands, and starts getting the door open. First the barricade, an old desk of sold mahogany, then the bar they’d nailed on, then the locks. There were two but only one worked anymore.

He grabs the shotgun before he opens the door, a blast of cold winter air hitting him full on the face. Fraser doesn’t leave the porch, though he wants to, but he’s wary of leaving their safe haven even for a few minutes. It may not look like anyone else is out tonight —this late, the cold is better at keeping even the most desperate indoors, but all it takes is one mistake. Fraser keeps an eye on the house across the street and four down. Their temporary neighbors have been less than neighborly and the flicker of light at the window is less than reassuring.

Most of the houses are dark, silent and abandoned. Trash and dead cars, pulled apart for scraps, litter the sidewalks. When the power grid first went down eight months ago, it had been controlled chaos at first. People in the streets, trying to figure out what was going on with no tv or computers to let them know. Radio still worked, but the news wasn’t good. Bombs on the coasts. No one knew who sent them. Refugees on the roads and the National guard trying to keep the peace. It only lasted as long as the supplies did. The police were overwhelmed, the mob and gangs took over when supplies started running out. Confusion turned into chaos. It wasn’t long before the great city of Chicago became a real war zone.

Dief bounds ahead of Ray and Ray, and when he leaps up the steps, Fraser sees blood on his muzzle.

“Are you hurt?” he calls out, just loud enough to all three of them. Dief dances around, fine, wanting Fraser to follow him back to help the Rays, but they’re almost to the steps. They’re hard to see, but Ray Kowalski is holding up Ray Vecchio who stumbles along.

“He got jumped,” says Ray as he drags them both up the steps. Fraser steps back to hold the door open, and as soon as they’re through, barricades it again. Four strikes and the bar is nailed back in place, then he rushes over to help Ray lower Ray to the couch. He’s soaked through. “Bastards left him in a puddle,” says Ray. “I don’t know how long, and he don’t either.”

“I would have called.” Ray is stiff and starts listing as soon as he’s seated. His hat is gone and his coat is covered in slush and smells like garbage. Fraser’s fingers fumble the buttons that don’t want to come free. Ray’s eyes open to slits. “Hey, Benny,” he slurs. “Stan here found me.”

“That he did, Ray,” Fraser smiles at him, doesn’t like the too easy grin that crosses Ray’s face. He’s not shivering. “Ray,” he says urgently as he finally gets the coat unbuttoned and off Ray’s shoulders. His other Ray is working on shoes and socks and now pants. “We’ve got to get him warmed up. You have him? I’m going to find towels.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got him,” says Ray, straightening so he can grab Ray’s shoulder and keep him from falling over. “Hey, Vecchio, you with me? What did I say about keeping your eyes open.”

With an effort, Ray opens his eyes, still spacey but awake. “So I can look at your ugly mug?”

“Yeah.” Ray leans forward and presses a kiss to Ray’s forehead. “So you can look at my ugly mug. Help me get your shirt off.”

“It’s cold.”

“Gotta get it off to get warmer.”

Fraser runs to the dining room where they’ve piled all the supplies they’ve scavenged on this trip. He spares a thought for their home base with Ma Vecchio and Francesca and half a dozen former cops and their families, but only a moment as he shuffles what they pulled from upstairs. There are two towels and he grabs the blankets too, then goes to the living room where their sleeping bags are just inside the door. The youngsters sleeping by the fire don’t stir.

Back in the front room, he hands the towels and blankets off to Ray who’s gotten Ray out of his clothes already and starts patting him down while Fraser zips the sleeping bags together.

“Here, hold this tight.” Ray wraps a blanket around Ray and guides his hands to hold it closed. “You got it?”

“I got it, Stanley,” says Ray. “You gonna strip for me?” He actually perks up a bit when Ray shrugs out of his own jacket and peels off his sweatshirt and the two shirts underneath in one go. Fraser looks up too. Where he’d been lean before, Ray is downright skinny now, whipcord thin, and Fraser can count his ribs, but he’s still beautiful. He shudders in the chill air.

“How’s that sleeping bag coming?” he asks Fraser, hopping a little up and down as he shimmies out of his pants.

Fraser shakes out the combined bags and piles up the rest of the blankets into a nest. “We’ll be as snug as bugs in a rug,” he says, getting to his feet and narrowly missing Ray’s bare ass in his face as he bends over to get his shoes off. He gives it a friendly pat — “Hey!” — and helps his other Ray up from the couch, pulling him into a hug and finally breathes in for the first time since he didn’t return by sunset. “You gave us a scare, Ray,” he whispers in his ear.

“I know, Benny,” says Ray. He leans heavily against Fraser, resting his head on his shoulder. “‘M sleepy.”

“I know, but you need to stay awake for a little bit longer. Until we get you warm.”

“‘M cold, too.”

“Here,” says Ray from the floor, tucked into the sleeping bag with his arms outstretched. Fraser helps Ray down, out of his blanket, and into the bag with Ray, and thirty seconds later he skins out of his own clothes and slides in on the other side. Ray is wedged safely between them, chilly and clammy and smelling terrible, but breathing, still breathing. And finally starting to shiver.

Fraser wraps his arms around Ray and buries his face at the back of his neck. Smelling terrible or not, Fraser is so thankful, so very thankful that he’s there. His other Ray’s voice is steady and constant, saying the nonsense that they all need to hear.

“Gonna get you warm,” he says. “Then this will all be over in the morning. It’ll be sunny and bright and you’ll be complaining about being the melted cheese in the sandwich. Isn’t that right? Right, Vecchio, come on, let me know you’re still listening.”

“You still,” Ray takes a deep breath that Fraser can feel expand against his chest, “talk too much.”

“Yeah, and I’m going to keep talking too much,” says Ray, and Fraser hears his smile. “That right, Fraser?”

“That’s right, Ray. We’ll get you warm, but you need to stay awake.” He rubs gently at Ray’s arms and presses closer to his cold feet. “As soon as you’re warmer, I’ll boil some water and get hot fluids into you. We need to warm you from the inside out and increase the temperature of your internal organs.”

“Rub some blood back into you,” adds Ray.

“You g-gonna rub m-me anywhere inter-r-resting?” Ray’s teeth chatter.

“Don’t tell me you got blue balls,” says Ray. “Oh, wait.”

Fraser hides his smile in Ray’s neck, all their chuckles chipping away the rest of the fear of the long, long night. When Ray had gone out after him — “I know these streets better than you Fraser, and you gotta stay and look out for those kids” — Fraser almost went out after him a dozen times.

He’d never been good at staying behind. The worst part is not knowing what's happening out there, where anything can happen. When the world changed, everything he thought he knew changed forever too. It wasn’t enough to do the right thing and appeal to people’s better nature. The law was gone, and justice was a notion that barely anyone recognized anymore.

Sometimes it feels like all Fraser has anymore is the men in the sleeping bag with him.

He holds tight, his hands trapped between Ray and Ray, and Ray’s hands holding on to him too.

“Listen, you stay awake, I’ll rub you anywhere you want,” says Ray.

“P-promise?”

“Yeah. Frase too.”

“Y-yeah?”

“I promise, Ray.”

“Hey, hey, no sleeping till you’re warm.” Fraser hears Ray gently tap Ray’s cheek.

“Tell me a st-story then.”

“No bedtime stories,” says Fraser.

“Tell a Lou Skaganetti.”

“Tell how it’s g-going to be in C-Canada,” says Ray, twisting so he can see Fraser’s face, so he can press a kiss to the corner of Fraser’s mouth.

Ray smiles, tired and sleepy, but his lips are lukewarm, and Fraser can’t help but kiss him back. He twists his hands until he’s holding onto both his Rays, holds them close in this dark and weary Chicago.

He tells them, “This spring, we’ll gather everybody and all our supplies and go due north.”


End file.
